Aurora Rising

The Aurora Cycle, Book 1

By: Amie Kaufman, Jay Kristoff

Narrated by: Kim Mai Guest, Johnathan McClain, Candice Moll, Lincoln Hoppe, Donnabella Mortel, Jonathan Todd Ross, Erin Spencer, Steve West

Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins

Publisher's Summary

From the New York Times and internationally best-selling authors of the Illuminae Files comes a new science fiction epic....

The year is 2380, and the graduating cadets of Aurora Academy are being assigned their first missions. Star pupil Tyler Jones is ready to recruit the squad of his dreams, but his own boneheaded heroism sees him stuck with the dregs nobody else in the academy would touch....

A cocky diplomat with a black belt in sarcasm

A sociopath scientist with a fondness for shooting her bunkmates 

A smart-ass tech whiz with the galaxy's biggest chip on his shoulder

An alien warrior with anger-management issues

A tomboy pilot who's totally not into him, in case you were wondering

And Ty's squad isn't even his biggest problem - that'd be Aurora Jie-Lin O'Malley, the girl he's just rescued from interdimensional space.

Trapped in cryo-sleep for two centuries, Auri is a girl out of time and out of her depth. But she could be the catalyst that starts a war millions of years in the making, and Tyler's squad of losers, discipline cases, and misfits might just be the last hope for the entire galaxy.

NOBODY PANIC.

Audiobook Cast of Narrators:
Aurora, read by Kim Mai Guest
Tyler, read by Johnathan McClain
Cat, read by Candice Moll
Fin, read by Lincoln Hoppe
Zila, read by Donnabella Mortel
Magellan, read by Jonathan Todd Ross
Scarlett, read by Erin Spencer
Kal, read by Steve West 

©2019 Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff (P)2019 Listening Library

Critic Reviews

"This intergalactic space opera has it all: action, thrills, suspense, laughs, and all the feels." (Kirkus Reviews, starred review)

"Rotating perspectives and never-flagging energy propel this narrative forward, which, if it wasn't compelling enough on its own, is given illustrious life by its ragtag, always-at-odds cast." (Booklist, starred review)

Excellent story, but a little overly emotive

Overall I enjoyed this book....though it did spend more time than I prefer exploring what individual characters were feeling at almost any particular moment. The narration was first person, jumping from character to character by the chapter. This was done extremely well and really helped me, as a reader, to connect with the characters. But the YA target audience was in full bloom with all the extra time devoted to what each character felt. By about 1/3 of the way into the book there came a place in most chapters where I wanted to yell, "Just get on with it!" because so much time/space was dedicated to exploring any given character's feelings at that moment.

Besides that, excellent writing and pacing. The characters came across as well thought out and I found myself caring about all of them by the end, which is the mark of a good writer in my book. Though this is the first book in the series, a large portion of the conflicts that are set up early on in the book are resolved (to a lesser or greater degree) by the end of the book. It definitely ends on a note which sets the stage for a continuation of the series, but there is clear resolution to the plot lines of this book.

The cast did an awesome job with the narration. Voices of characters were consistent, even from the perspectives of different characters, which meant a different narrator could be doing a certain character's voice at any time. The sound effects were, for the most part decent. Though there were a few surrounding the computer entries that hedged on being too shrill. It would behoove the sound engineers to remember that most people are listening to these recordings via headphones and thusly very high-pitched tones come across very harshly, especially when their volume is the same or louder than the narrators. It was annoying but it didn't really detract too much from the listening experience.

As for the worldview, there are religious tones, but the religion is ambiguously deistic, but not really concretely attached to a recognizable religion (like Christianity or Islam). There is a decent amount of relationship drama (she likes him, he may like her...blah, blah, blah), but no explicit sexual interactions. There is an allusion to a few of the main characters having had sex in the past (with each other), and the general approach to sexuality is "whatever goes". The narrative doesn't really preach or deal with sexual preferences overtly, but at least one character is presented as ambiguously bi-sexual. I don't think there's too much in there that would offend anyone, but it's always good for parents to be aware of how things are presented in the books they're reading. I did like that moral impact of killing someone was touched upon.

So, overall, fun book. I'll probably eventually snag the next in the series when I feel like I can handle the emotive excursions in the narrative. Because the premise and story were excellent and I'm pretty hooked as far as wanting to see what happens next to the characters.

For better or worse it was a fun ride.

So first off I liked it overall. The overall story was a bit generic but I enjoyed nonetheless. I had some issues though That really took me out of the story.

The characters suffer from same voice like maybe 2 characters had their own voice and one of them barely had any development and her perspective chapter's were litterally short af.

Does Tyler even have any character flaws? Like he's apparently perfect. Everytime he's mentioned we hear about how good he is how handsome how great of a leader how blond his hair is how he has perfect dimples hoe blue his eyes are. Like that annoyed me to no end. The ship could be in fire and they litterally would stop to mention his dimples.

It's so young adult at times it's unbearable. How the characters interact. How the romances play out. Etc like I get itd ya but cmon it's just tropy at times.

And the books defaults whiteness. Like white people are the norm and anything else human wise has to be explained. The author describes all the white human characters by hair and eye color. But the black woman of the group damn near everytime she's mentioned has to have a quick sentence about how dark her skin is or about her big gold hoop earrings. Like cmon now. Lots of authors do something like this. Once you start to notice it it's hard to stop.

I did like the eventual villains though. I'm optimistically looking foward to a sequel.

Full cast makes this audio

This was a great listen. There's a full cast plus sound effects, so it almost felt like listening to a movie. The plot was great and action packed with no dull moments. I was so invested in the story and characters and didn't want it to end!

More of a sci fi romance

I think the authors are very good. The actors are excellent. I just feel there was way more emotionsplaining than nessessary. I felt the plot is fantastic and has a lot of potential, but if the trip there is flat the majority of the way it won’t end well.

Well done story and characters! Bad performance :(

This book was very enjoyable! The plot and characters were very well developed. However, the performance was lacking. The voice for Aurora did not fit the character at all, and I actually questioned whether not I could listen to her the whole book. I was able to get through it hoping her voice would grow on me but it never did. The story itself is what kept me listening. Also, I wish Audible would stop using separate people for separate voices, I like one steady voice (personal opinion).

didn’t like the cast

I loved the book, the writing and the story, but I did not enjoy the voice selection for the characters.

2/3 of greatness

Great open, great middle, but the urgency of the ending was ruined by seemingly endless streams of inner dialogue. I wanted to feel for the characters, at the end, but it was all inner dialogue.

Not what I expected not really interactive.

The story is interesting and moderately paced. Unfortunately the Narrators don’t interact like a traditional radio show. Instead each Narrator reads a chapter to include each character. I should have caught this in the sample, but I thought the story intriguing. Doubtful I will continue this series.

Amazing fun sci-fi!!

Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff have done it again!! All the stars to this brilliant book!

If you enjoyed The Illuminae Files, you are going to love the Aurora Cycle series. This was kind of a Firefly meets Six of Crows with Legolas from Lord of the Rings thrown in and it was phenomenal! As with the Illuminae Files, I became so dang attached to this group of misfits who are thrown together under the command of Mr. Perfect, Tyler.

Cat is the Mohawk haired, tatooed smart-ass pilot (the Ace). Scar is Tyler's beautiful smart-ass twin sister in charge of diplomacy (the Face). Zila, the odd quiet genius and medic (the Brain). Finian, the smart-ass alien Betraskan mechanic (the Gearhead), and Kal, the Legolas-looking elf-looking alien Syldrathi warrior (the Tank). Together, the six form Squad 312.

Enter Aurora, or Auri, who was rescued by Tyler from a dead colonist ship where she had been in a cryogenic tank for over 200 years. The squad ends up with Auri and from there, the craziness just keeps on keeping on. The pace, the twists, the turns, the action... Never. Stops!

This book could easily be one of my top favs of 2019, and how the heck am I going to be able to wait for book 2!?

Update after my reread by audiobook: This audiobook featuring an entire cast was AMAZING!! Every single character was spot on perfection for their character! The sound effects were so fun! This will be one of my go to audiobooks and I’m sure I’ll listen to it again and again!!

Fun, fast paced space adventure!

Loved it! The story was fast paced, the space crew of misfits was hilarious, and the voices in this full cast production were amazing! If you loved Illuminae Files or Guardians of the Galaxy, definitely give this new space series a listen!